To commit serious crimes, cybercriminals rely on sneak attacks. Internet Protocol address spoofing, also known as IP spoofing, is one such method. Read this blog to know everything about IP spoofing attacks.
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What is IP Spoofing Attack?
IP spoofing is a technique that attackers frequently use to initiate man-in-the-middle attacks and distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks against specific target devices or nearby infrastructures. IP spoofing enables cybercriminals to carry out malicious actions without being detected. This includes malware infecting your device, stealing your personal information, and crashing your server. A threat actor can do this by using another computer’s IP address to portray as a trusted source in order to get access to your desktop, device, or connection. Some other network spoofing attacks include DNS attacks and ARP spoofing attacks.
When computer hackers use spoofed IP source addresses to disguise as reliable sources, it can be dangerous for a variety of reasons, including the following:
- Unsuspecting people may be vulnerable to having their personal information stolen and used for malicious reasons such as identity theft and other digital frauds as a result of IP spoofing.
- IP spoofing attacks have the potential to overload and shut down company servers and websites.
How does IP Spoofing Work?
What is the mechanism of IP address spoofing? To begin, please remember that every device capable of accessing the internet has an internet protocol (IP) address that provides it with a unique identity. IP packets are used to transport data over the internet, and each packet includes an IP header. The packet’s routing information, such as its source and destination IP addresses, is shared in the IP header.
An attacker can use IP spoofing to remove the source IP address in a packet header with a forged, or spoofed IP address. The attacker accomplishes this by intercepting and reconfiguring an IP packet before sending it to its intended destination. This means that the IP address appears to be from a trusted source – the original IP address – while concealing its true origin: a hidden third party.
The beauty of spoofing an IP address in the eyes of hackers is that it allows them to impersonate another computer system and appear to be from a trustworthy source. This allows an attacker to conceal their true identity and, most likely, bypass your firewall. A hacker can fool you into thinking you’re communicating with a trusted website or person – such as a close friend – when you’re actually communicating with a fraudster by spoofing an IP address.
As you can see, IP spoofing promotes anonymity by masking the identities of the sources. This can be beneficial to cybercriminals for three reasons in particular.
- Attackers can conceal their identities from law enforcement and others by using spoof IP addresses.
- Because the compromised computers and networks aren’t always alert that they’ve been affected, they don’t send out alert messages.
- Because spoofed IP addresses appear to be from trusted sources, they can avoid detection by firewalls and other security measures that would otherwise blacklist them as a fraudulent source.
Here’s a real-world example of an IP spoof attack to demonstrate how the scheme works. In 2018, a large DDoS attack was launched against GitHub, which was carried out by spoofing GitHub’s IP address and transferring data to multiple servers. These servers then multiplied the amount of data returned to GitHub by a factor of 50. This traffic volume overwhelmed GitHub’s website, causing it to go temporarily unavailable for 10 minutes.
How to Identify IP Spoofing?
IP spoofing is difficult for end-users to detect. These attacks take place at the network layer, which is Layer 3 of the Open Systems Interconnection networking model. That way, there are no visible signs of tampering. Externally, the spoofed connection requests appear to be genuine connection requests.
However, companies can use network monitoring techniques to undertake traffic analysis at network endpoints. The most common method is packet filtering.
Packet filtering systems are frequently found within routers and firewalls. They detect discrepancies between the IP address of the packet and the intended IP addresses on access control lists (ACLs). They can also detect forged packets.
Tips to Prevent IP Spoofing Attack
Here are some preventive measures you can take to keep your devices, information, network, and connections safe from IP spoofing.
- To protect traffic to and from your server, use secure encryption protocols. Try to make sure “HTTPS” and the padlock icon are always in the Address bar of websites you visit.
- Set up a firewall to better shield your network by filtering traffic with spoofed IP addresses, checking that traffic, and blocking unauthorized outsiders from accessing it. This will enable the authentication of IP addresses.
- Take measures to make web browsing safer. This includes not using unsecured public Wi-Fi to access the internet. If you must use a public hotspot, use a VPN, which authenticates your internet connection to defend the private information you send and receive. You can also follow some public Wi-Fi best practices to securely use it.
- Be cautious of phishing emails from attackers requesting that you change your password, other login information, or payment card data, as well as perform actions such as making donations. During the coronavirus, cybercriminals used phishing emails as a tool. Some of these spoofing emails offer the most up-to-date COVID-19 information, while others collect donations. So rather than clicking on the link in the phishing email, manually enter the website link into your browser to see if it’s genuine.
- Use packet filtering systems, such as ingress filtering, which is a network systems technique that ensures packet data are from trusted sources rather than hackers. This is accomplished by inspecting the source headers of packets. Egress filtering, in a similar manner, can be used to observe and limit outbound traffic, or packets that lack genuine source headers and inability to meet security protocols.
Many cases of IP spoofing could be avoided with preventative measures. This includes putting in place safe encryption protocols, firewalls, and packet filtering. Always use caution when going online, and be extremely cautious of unsecured Wi-Fi and websites, spam email, and other fraudulent scams.
